the most essential or complex step required to accomplish a specific objective, and upon which the entire form depends, as in “I know these other IT systems are important but getting the core ERP right is the long pole in the tent”; the sense of this term would have been more readily apparent in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, during which traveling carnivals, various entertainments, revival meetings, etc., drew large crowds and required the setting up of large temporary tents whose roof would be held up by a single central pole, the failure of which would render the whole structure unusable; as with much jargon this term has a heritage in U.S. military and political lingo